Norris Tops Oscar Piastri in Brazilian Practice
The British driver has outperformed his teammate at each of the past five grands prix.
The McLaren driver just pipped team-mate and championship contender the Australian for the quickest lap in the closing stages of practice at the Sao Paulo Grand Prix.
The British racer, who seized the title advantage from his teammate by just one point after taking the win in the Mexican Grand Prix a fortnight back, beat the Melbourne-born driver by a tiny margin of 0.023secs.
Earlier in the session, Oscar Piastri had been the leading McLaren throughout the hour before the sprint shootout due at the evening session.
The Red Bull star, the only other driver in the championship fight, sitting 36 points behind Norris, was classified in P17 as his team opted for a different programme.
His teammate Yuki Tsunoda was the only driver to go off, if briefly, when he rotated at Turn Four early in the session.
Tsunoda slid over the curbs on exit before rotating through the run-off area, and was fortunate to get away with just a light touch of the wall.
The Ferrari of the seven-time champion also spun, at the final moments of the session, rotating twice through the quick descending Mergulho corner leading to the last turn on to the start-finish straight.
The seven-time champion ended the session in 19th place, trailing teammate Charles Leclerc.
The McLaren drivers were significantly quicker of the remaining drivers, with the German's Sauber P3, 0.619 seconds slower than Piastri's best.
The Aston Martin of Fernando Alonso was fourth quickest, with Sauber's Gabriel Bortoleto fifth from Mercedes' George Russell and the Alpine of Gasly and Williams' Sainz.
